Problems installing ping in docker

I am trying to follow the docker tutorial but in a virtual machine. I've tried to install ping in ubuntu docker container with the command

sudo docker run ubuntu apt-get install ping

The problem is that docker doesn't install anything and gives the answer as follows

$ sudo docker run ubuntu apt-get install ping
Reading package lists...
Building dependency tree...
Package ping is a virtual package provided by: inetutils-ping 2:1.8-6 iputils-ping 3:20101006-1ubuntu1
E: Package 'ping' has no installation candidate
$

The same problem appears when I'm trying to install anything.

These are my images:

REPOSITORY TAG IMAGE ID CREATED VIRTUAL SIZE
<none> <none> 3a28cc5bcc53 19 minutes ago 247.6 MB
baselDaemon latest 4e892058b0b2 4 days ago 204.4 MB
ubuntu 13.10 9f676bd305a4 2 weeks ago 178 MB
ubuntu saucy 9f676bd305a4 2 weeks ago 178 MB
ubuntu 13.04 eb601b8965b8 2 weeks ago 166.5 MB
ubuntu raring eb601b8965b8 2 weeks ago 166.5 MB
ubuntu 12.10 5ac751e8d623 2 weeks ago 161 MB
ubuntu quantal 5ac751e8d623 2 weeks ago 161 MB
ubuntu 10.04 9cc9ea5ea540 2 weeks ago 180.8 MB
ubuntu lucid 9cc9ea5ea540 2 weeks ago 180.8 MB
ubuntu 12.04 9cd978db300e 2 weeks ago 204.4 MB
ubuntu latest 9cd978db300e 2 weeks ago 204.4 MB
ubuntu precise 9cd978db300e 2 weeks ago 204.4 MB
learn/tutorial latest 8dbd9e392a96 10 months ago 128 MB

Also, when I run sudo docker run ubuntu apt-get install ping what is the 'ubuntu' used here?

Thank you in advance.

2

4 Answers

According to:

Package ping is a virtual package provided by: inetutils-ping 2:1.8-6 iputils-ping 3:20101006-1ubuntu1
E: Package 'ping' has no installation candidate

Try with:

sudo docker run ubuntu apt-get install iputils-ping

You choose a 'ubuntu' with repository:tag in place of IMAGE in RUN command

sudo docker run ubuntu:lucid command

2

run apt-get update once before the install:

sudo docker run ubuntu apt-get update

see What does sudo apt-get update do?

apt-get update downloads the package lists from the repositories and "updates" them to get information on the newest versions of packages and their dependencies.

1

Yeah ultimately you need to know about three different topics:

1. Docker
2. Ubuntu
3. APT repositories

Here's how I like to get Ubuntu running in a Docker container:

docker run -i -t ubuntu:16.04 /bin/bash

Echoing what @Michael_Scharf recommends, here's how you update your APT repositories:

apt-get update

Then working back to @VTacius' solution, here's how to install the IP utilities responsible for the ping command:

apt-get install iputils-ping

Then to verify things are working as expected:

which ping
ping superuser.com

2

Faced the same issue when using ubuntu 16.04 image in docker.

The following steps helped me resolve this issue.

1. Login to docker container as bash

   $ docker exec -it <conatiner id> bash

2. inside the docker container, execute following commands. First update apt-get

   $ apt-get update

3. Second install iputils-ping

   $ apt-get install iputils-ping

This should work.

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